If you make your bed every morning you will have accomplished the first task of the day.
It will give you a small sense of pride, and it will encourage you to do another task
and another and another. By the end of the day, that one task completed will have turned
into many tasks completed. Making your bed will also reinforce the fact that little
things in life matter. If you can't do the little things right, you will never do the
big things right.
And, if by chance you have a miserable day, you will come home to a bed that is made
— that you made — and a made bed gives you encouragement that tomorrow will be better.
If you want to change the world, start off by making your bed.
- Admiral William H. McRaven
It usually even fills me with the opposite feeling. I don't like sleeping in "made beds". They're very constricting. A made bed may look tidy, but I don't look at my bed other than when I go to sleep.
Not wrong. Try this alternative: Relocate your bed within the room, even if only by a few inches. If better, keep the modest improvement to your local environment. If worse, move the bed back and keep the knowledge.
Honestly I feel like there are people out there that are massively affected by the environment around them. They can't work without a tidy desk, eat without the cupboards closed etc. A tidy desk or closed doors don't effect my mental well being, neither a bed in disarray, or bed not centered in the room? I go about my day blissfully unaware of any of it.
I'm inclined to agree, but when I moved in with my girlfriend that changed. My girlfriend is one of those people who finds fulfillment in busywork. She likes a made bed.
So now I find meaning in making the bed, because she likes it made.
“Without courage, men will be ruled by tyrants and despots. Without courage, no great society can flourish. Without courage, the bullies of the world rise up. With it, you can accomplish any goal. With it, you can defy and defeat evil.”
There are many gems in that speech, but I took the excerpt that was more relevant as a reply. I am not militaristic but I do believe that discipline makes your life better.
This is as good a place as any to ask: what does it mean to "make your bed"? I've been hearing this expression for years, and always have a vague impression of arranging your blankets, pillows, etc., neat and tidy - but that's just my assumption based on context.
Growing up in India in the 90s, we generally made our beds (in a more literal sense) in the night: unrolling a dried grass mat [1] on the floor, a few blankets on top of that (a woollen one in the middle if it's winter), and a pillow or two. In the morning, the blankets were folded, mat rolled up, pillows and everything stashed away in a shelf until it's night again. The first time I came across this expression, I thought this is what they meant - to make this contraption in the morning itself!
In your context making your bed would be the reverse. It would be storing away the contraption. The saying refers to people’s habit of leaving their beds a mess of twisted blankets and a bumble of pillows.
